


A scottish winter

by acGranger



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: (hence the mature rating), Baking as Stress Relief, Christmas market, Coming Out, Enemies to Lovers, Fluff, Getting Together, Hogwarts Eighth Year, M/M, Past Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley, Post-War, Sharing a Bed, Wet Dream, permission to podfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-01
Updated: 2020-12-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:26:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27523807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/acGranger/pseuds/acGranger
Summary: Hogwarts re-opens after the battle, welcoming back all students from the previous year. But due to some unfixed damage to the castle, all students staying for the holidays get moved to a nearby scottish town for the winter. As the move had to happen rather quickly, some planning mistakes happened and Draco and Harry end up rooming together. In itself bad enough but when the room only has one bed it gets worse.A story with some baking, Draco and Harry avoiding their feelings and a christmas market.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 7
Kudos: 119
Collections: Harry/Draco Owlpost 2020





	A scottish winter

**Author's Note:**

  * For [orpheous87](https://archiveofourown.org/users/orpheous87/gifts).



> For orpheous, I hope you like this :)
> 
> Many thanks to my wonderful, wonderful beta. You know you found the right one when they comment gifs onto your work, because words just arent enough.

It was a rather peculiar problem to say the least. With Hogwarts being badly damaged during the final battle — just months before the new school year started, and consequently, Harry’s eighth year — there had been constant reconstructing by a team of witches and wizards who worked on fixing damaged hallways, classrooms and most importantly: the wards. 

The ‘problem’ had made itself known around Halloween, when the weather was positively chilly. The charm work inside the castle walls had apparently been affected more than originally presumed, leaving many classrooms without weather protection. Like a net unraveling, the failing temperature charms were seeping into other parts of the castle and by the beginning of December not one common room was left unaffected and McGonnagall had had enough. 

Claiming that she could not let the students stay a night longer when they were sure to need a winter coat in their dorms, she cancelled classes and let all students leave on an early winter break. The students were given assignments to read up on during that time and that had been it. 

As though it had been an afterthought, it was arranged that those students who had signed up to stay in the castle during the Christmas break would be going on a “trip” to a muggle town up north.

Which is how Harry found himself in the current predicament; standing in a doorway with Malfoy of all people, looking at a small room with only one bed. 

“No way,” Malfoy said, “I am NOT sharing a bed with you. Not happening.” Despite his words Malfoy didn’t move out of the doorway. His voice shaking slightly, the normal haughtiness and sneer seeming off, “Don’t you have your own house you can go to? Visit the Weasel? ANYTHING?” 

Harry winced at that. He had originally planned to spend Christmas at the Burrow, but after his break up with Ginny, his plans had changed. It’s not that any of the Weasleys blamed him for the breakup but things between him and his ex-girlfriend were rather awkward, and Harry could do without living with her for a month. 

“No I don’t,” Harry shot back, which was technically not true. He had Grimmauld Place, but the place was filled with too many memories he didn’t dare unpack yet and therefore, he had no desire to go anywhere near the place. Even back during the summer he couldn’t bring himself to enter the ancestral home once, so he stayed at the Burrow and later on Hogwarts.

“Can’t you just go to your fucking manor if sharing a bed bugs you this much?” Harry found himself asking hopefully, although he knew that Malfoy indeed could not go back to the manor. The ministry had confiscated it along with most of the Malfoy funds for the time being.

Malfoy cursed under his breath before shooting him a death glare and stormed into the room they would be sharing for the next month, nearly slapping Harry in the face with the door. Grumbling, Harry stomped off to the common area. He would deal with Malfoy later.

\---

Evening came faster than Harry wanted it to and so he reluctantly made his way to his and Malfoy’s room. He was dead tired.

With quite a lot of people needing to be relocated rather quickly Harry supposed he could be glad things weren’t worse. McGonagall had organized multiple cottages for the older students seeing as they were capable of caring for themselves. The younger years were staying with the staff in the little hostel on the edge of town. 

Normally Harry would have been delighted with the situation. He didn’t have to go to the Burrow, didn’t have to face Grimmauld Place, he didn’t have to deal with the hero-worshipping there would have been if they had decided to stay in a wizarding place, and thanks to McGonagall, they were even allowed to use magic inside the cottages. It was ideal. 

Or so he kept telling himself with each step towards his room. When he was two feet away from the door, he couldn’t ignore reality any longer. Things could have been worse, but rooming with Draco Malfoy of all people definitely wasn’t ideal. Damn McGonagall for choosing the roommates and damn McGonagall for refusing to let Harry switch rooms; He had asked.

For a short moment Harry considered knocking, before just opening the door. He instantly regretted his choice when he was greeted with, “Ever heard of knocking Potter? Or are you trying to catch me naked? Pervert.” 

Despite the comment, Malfoy sat on the bed fully clothed and appeared to be reading.

“Shut up Malfoy. As long as we can’t stay in the castle, this is my room too.” Harry replied, too tired to argue. The day had been draining enough and he simply wanted to go to sleep, even if that meant sharing a bed with Malfoy; at least the bed was big enough for two.

He pulled his pajamas out of his trunk and grabbed his toothbrush before heading to the bathroom to get ready for the night. When he came back into the room, he saw that Malfoy had also changed into pajamas but showed no other indication of going to sleep as he sat on top of the covers still reading.

Feeling resigned and slightly nervous, Harry got into bed inches from Malfoy, placing his wand under his pillow.

“If anything happens to me, McGonagall will know it was you, so don’t you dare fucking touch me,” he growled before turning to face the wall and block out Malfoy and his damn Lumos.

\---

Harry woke to water in his face and a throbbing feeling in his arm. Reflexively he grabbed his wand from under his pillow and pointed at the attacker. Moments later he recognized his attacker to be none other than his unfortunate bed mate. “What the hell Malfoy?” he sputtered, looking around to see it was still dark outside. 

“Oh good you’re finally awake. Cut the bloody screaming and thrashing around. People are trying to sleep here.” And the blond git had the audacity to shove Harry back onto his pillow before lying back down himself. 

Harry lay awake for a long time after that, listening to Malfoys breathing change into soft snores.

\---

When Harry woke next, it was to warmth encasing him and the blaring sound of his alarm. 

“shut it OFF!” came a sleepy grumbling from behind him. When Harry rolled over to turn off his alarm, a hand fell from his hip.

Immediately awake, Harry realized that not only was he on Malfoys side of the bed, but also that Malfoy was cuddling him from behind. Hastily, Harry scrambled to his still damp side of the bed, and turned off his alarm. Glad to be away from Malfoy, Harry left the room quickly before the Slytherin could fully wake up. 

\---

Harry spent the day avoiding Malfoy, which was quite a feat considering that neither of them left the small cottage that the 8th years were sharing. 

Harry had spent some time with Dean in their makeshift common room, watching the other sketch away in his notebook, then trying to hold still after Dean asked if he could sketch his hair to try and get the texture onto paper, “As a challenge,” he had said. 

After Dean’s rather unsuccessful attempts at sketching Harry’s unruly hair, Harry found himself alone in the kitchen and decided to bake — Molly had taught him how during the summer and Harry had missed doing so while at Hogwarts. 

As the cottage filled with the scent of vanilla crescents, most of the other residents came shuffling into the kitchen one by one, at which point Harry decided to put on some hot cocoa while they waited for the crescents to cool. Standing in the kitchen with Dean, Hannah, Neville and Susan was surprisingly nice. There was powdered sugar everywhere, Neville had a cocoa mustache and with the laughter filling the room, it almost felt like they were just normal teenagers. Harry startled when he saw Malfoy rush past the kitchen and drenched himself in his cocoa, the laughter only grew stronger. With a swirl of her wand, Hannah cleaned his clothes.

When the day came to an end, Harry took the stairs up, passing Neville and Dean’s door to his dreaded room that he had avoided all day. He knocked this time, but didn’t really wait for an invitation, ’let Malfoy be angry’ he thought.

He wasn’t. He only glanced up from his book long enough to see Harry step through the door before continuing with his reading. Harry had hoped that Malfoy had finally resigned himself to their situation, but all his hopes were crushed the moment he lay down in bed; Harry once again in his pajamas under the blanket, Malfoy sitting on top of the covers fully clothed except for shoes. 

The blond shut his book with a small ‘thump’. “Have you finally stopped running then?” Harry felt his cheeks get warm and opened his mouth, but he couldn’t decide if he should apologize for intruding on the others personal space or if he should deflect by reminding the git who had held who last night. He said neither, “We all get nightmares okay? Don’t act so bloody weird about it. I couldn’t understand your screaming anyway, so calm your tits.”

Harry closed his mouth at that, unsure of how to respond; that was certainly not what he had expected. “oh….uhm… o..Okay,” he finally stumbled out. And out of utter confusion he added “Good night then,” before once again turning his back to try to sleep.

Oddly enough, the soft breathing next to him only helped him fall asleep faster.

\---

When Harry started to drift awake, warmth greeted him, and it felt good enough that he simply snuggled deeper into his blankets, wanting to sleep for a few minutes more. As he drifted back to sleep, he imagined strong arms closing tighter around him, and he felt content. 

Suddenly he was falling and then there was cold, hard wood beneath him and Harry realised that he must have fallen off the bed. With a groan he heaved himself from the floor, watching as Malfoy hurried into their en-suite.

Belatedly, Harry realised that his side of the bed faced the hallway, not the bathroom.

During breakfast, Harry sat silently and contemplated what had happened. The day before he had definitely woken up on Malfoy's side of the bed and Malfoy had definitely had an arm around him. And then this morning he had been on Malfoys side again, or at least he had fallen out of bed on Malfoy’s side. So what did it mean? 

He could blame it on the wet mattress for the first night, surely cuddling up to anyone was preferable to sleeping on that, even if it was Malfoy. Or so Harry argued, conveniently forgetting that he knew multiple charms to dry the mattress. It still boggled him how and why he had been on Malfoy’s side this morning AGAIN. There was just no reason for it. 

His thoughts drifted off and he absentmindedly continued eating his porridge. He nearly spat it out again when he remembered the early stages of the morning, remembered cuddling into warmth and imagining arms embracing him. What if he hadn’t imagined it? What if Malfoy had had his arms around Harry? 

Harry's mind was racing. He hadn’t fallen off the bed, Malfoy must have pushed him when he woke up and realized that he was cuddling with his nemesis. It would explain Malfoy fleeing into the bathroom and blocking it for at least 20 minutes. 

Sweet Merlin. He had cuddled Malfoy.

\---

Malfoy had predictably been absent the whole day. Harry had tried to find him, but gave up after checking each room in the cottage twice. He wasn’t desperate enough to go search the village, just to have that conversation. Yet. 

So for the first time since they left the castle, Harry went to bed alone. A corner of his brain was wondering where Malfoy was at this time of night. They hadn’t officially been set a curfew — since all of the eighth years were of age and after the war it would have been a farce anyway — but it still didn’t seem right for Malfoy to be out on his own all day and not having returned by nearly midnight. 

While he was getting ready for bed and afterwards laying in his bed, Harry’s brain provided him with vivid memories and made-up situations of Malfoy getting insulted, threatened and harmed. 

After 15 minutes of rolling around in the empty feeling bed Harry sighed, reluctantly sat up and settled into sitting cross legged on the covers with his back leaning against the headboard. He closed his eyes and focussed on his breathing.

His mind healer had taught him different meditation techniques to calm him, to let him focus or to help him fall asleep. Harry slipped into the familiar breathing pattern with ease and sleep soon found him while still sitting against the headboard. 

Harry never noticed the mattress dipping when Malfoy snuck into bed half an hour later.

\---

A moan pulled him out of his sleep the next morning. So faint that Harry was convinced he had imagined it, thinking it could have been his dream, but before he could recall what exactly he had been dreaming about the moan sounded again, louder this time. And while the first one had been somewhat ambiguous, this one was definitely lascivious.

Suddenly wide awake, Harry realised that Malfoy was having a bloody sex-dream — right next to him. He fumbled for his wand.

Before he could find it though, Malfoy let out yet another moan, followed by a mumbled “please…..fuck me, please. PLEASE!” Harry froze. This was worse than the bloody cuddling.  
Over the years he had heard multiple of his mates have wet dreams of course — living in a dorm did that — but those had been his mates, not Malfoy. And none of them sounded as desperate or sinful and none of them had begged.

Another moan: loud and clear, “YES please, please! yes…harder… please!”

He felt himself blush. He shouldn’t be listening to this and above all he shouldn’t be _liking_ it. Merlin and Morgana, this was Malfoy! He definitely shouldn’t be getting hard listening to him, but his body betrayed him.

Finally finding his wand, Harry cast a dim Lumos and grabbed his glasses. He looked over and found Malfoy laying half naked next to him, the blanket had slipped down onto his hips and the pale skin of his back looked ethereal in the glimmering light. 

Movement drew Harry’s eyes from the muscular shoulders and onto the hips still hidden underneath pajama pants and the blanket. It took him a moment to realise that Malfoy was rutting against the mattress. Harry gulped, casting Lumos had been a mistake. 

“hnnggg. Please. HARRY PLEASE”

Harry nearly toppled off the bed at hearing his name. He had to get out, away from Malfoy and his forsaken moaning. Merlin.

Wand in hand he dashed out of the room and fled to the kitchen. He would return after a tea, and maybe a cold shower.

He didn’t go back to their room that night.

\---

The sofa had left him with an aching back and a stiff neck. He supposed it was his own fault for falling asleep on it, but he still grumbled about it. 

As he was still only clad in pajamas, he headed up the stairs to his room and knocked before entering. He was hoping that Malfoy was still there and hadn’t already run off like he did yesterday.

“Yes?” came the posh voice from inside.

Harry opened the door. “Morning” he greeted and headed for the dresser. “Sleep well?”  
Malfoy scoffed. “Since when are we making small talk Potter?”

‘Potter,’ Harry’s brain provided, ‘I liked _HARRY_ better.’ Harry blushed furiously at that thought. In attempt to hide his fluster he shot back, “Since you woke me up with your fucking moaning.”

“Wh-.. What? I-...” Draco had dropped the shirt he had been holding. His eyes darted across the room, his body was tense,“Why didn’t you wake me then?” Malfoy demanded.

With a jolt Harry realised that Malfoy was scared, likely scared about what Harry might have heard. 

“Dunno. I thought about it, but then I just went to get tea.” He reached up to scratch his neck. “Waking you up would have been weird. So I just… left.”

“You just left.” Draco echoed, stopping his endeavour to melt into the wall. He still looked tense.

Harry thought about reassuring him, telling him he hadn’t heard anything, telling him the lies the other hoped to be true. But he couldn’t. Instead he said, “Don’t look at me like that, it’s not the first time I’ve woken up to a roommate having a sex dream. Let’s not make a big deal out of it okay?” He grabbed his clothes for the day and headed towards the bathroom. Just before he entered he turned once more, adding “I’m sorry I brought it up.” He closed the door and got ready for the day.

\---

It was late afternoon when Harry really realised why Malfoy had been so scared. Not only had his moaning disclosed that he liked Harry, but that he liked _men_. Even if he hadn’t said Harry’s name, he had begged to be fucked. No wonder he had been scared, he had unwillingly handed Harry a very personal secret and he didn’t even really know it.

With a groan, Harry buried his head in his hands. He knew how Malfoy must have felt in that very moment. He had felt all of that in the weeks leading up to his break up with Ginny. Shame. Panic. Helplessness. The constant fear of someone finding out and outing you to everyone else. 

His bisexuality hadn’t been the reason they had broken up; they had simply fallen out of love. The year spent apart had changed them both, and they each grew into different people and Harry liking men too had only been a contributing factor in that. Ginny hadn’t seen that at first, not understanding how they could have fallen out of love. She clung so desperately to the idea of them together that she had grasped onto every argument, and later every threat she could find, as a way to get him to stay. But when she had nearly outed him — that was the final straw. She had apologized, later on, but Harry still couldn’t really forgive her. 

So Harry waited for when he’d run into Draco during the day. He desperately wanted to talk to him — reassure him — but dinner had come and gone and Malfoy still hadn’t come out of their room. Scratching up all the Gryffindor courage he had, he grabbed a serving of the lasagna and headed upstairs. They really needed to talk.

His knock was answered by an annoyed “what?” so Harry simply went in.  
“It might surprise you, but you do need to eat sometimes. Shocking, I know.” Harry said with fake confidence, gesturing to the plate in his hand.

Malfoy was once again sitting on the bed, book in hand, but shuffled towards Harry at the mention of food. He looked suspiciously at the food before mumbling his thanks and beginning to eat, right on their bed. 

Harry stood around for a moment before awkwardly settling onto the rug in front of the bed.

“What do you want?” There it was again, the fear in his voice. Harry wondered if he really thought Harry would blackmail him, despite not knowing what Harry knew. 

“I’m bisexual, you know?” Harry rushed out, in an effort to get the awkward part over with.

“Congrats?” answered Malfoy in between bites. Moments later his eyes went wide, a blush crept up his cheeks. He put the fork down. “What did I do?”

Harry wanted to reassure him, flee from the awkward conversation but Malfoy beat him to an answer. “Please, you wouldn’t come out like this if nothing had happened last night. Just say what you have against me and what you want.”

Harry deflated, Mafloy thought Harry would blackmail him.  
“Do you really think I would have opened this conversation by coming out if I was just going to threaten you? Come on! That would be the worst blackmail attempt ever.”

Malfoy seemed to relax slightly at that, but he still hadn’t picked up his fork again.

“I told you about me so that you know that I won’t go around outing you. I realize that you probably don’t even want me to know about it and I am sorry for overhearing it okay?”

Harry tried to look him into the eyes but Malfoy kept his head down.

“I’m just telling you because I know how shitty it is having to fear being outed. This isn’t me saying I know what your sexuality is. This is just me telling you that when I woke up last night it sounded like you were having a rather enjoyable dream about someone male. I may be wrong, I may be right, but either way I am not judging you, nor will I tell on you. This is your thing. And like I said, I am sorry that I know about it.”

During Harry’s tirade Malfoy’s shoulders had dropped, his head had lifted in between only to now vehemently stare at his plate again. 

“Why did you run instead of waking me up?” His voice was barely there.

‘Because I was horny and couldn’t deal with you moaning my name’ Harry thought but aloud he said, “I didn’t want you to know that I know. I originally didn’t even plan on telling you that I heard you until I slipped this morning.”

That seemed to appease Malfoy as he picked up the fork again and resumed eating. Harry was about to get up and leave again, when Malfoy spoke up.

“I’m gay,” his gaze was still focused on the food, the shoulders shaking. 

Harry didn’t know what to say, but Malfoy kept shaking. After a few moments, he put his plate away and pulled his knees to his chest. A sob broke from him. Unsure of what to do Harry scrambled to his feet and after a moment's hesitation sat down next to Malfoy.

He tried to reassure Malfoy, telling him that it’s okay but the shaking didn’t subside. Hesitantly Harry placed his hand on Malfoys shoulder, awkwardly petting it. Instead of recoiling from the touch, Malfoy leaned in to it, so Harry wrapped his arms around the crying man and simply held him.

“I’m so sorry to force you out like this,” Harry mumbled, when the blond had finished crying and pulled away from him. He really should have thought all of this through before just confronting Malfoy with it. 

“It— It’s okay. Sorry for.. crying all over you,” sniffled Malfoy in response. He pulled his sleeves over his hands and dabbed away the last traces of tears on his face. Harry waved it off and got up; he was nearly at the door when Malfoy spoke up again.

“Potter! Thanks for not being an ass about it.”

“Don’t mention it,” Harry chuckled and turned. “One more thing though…”

Immediately Malfoy looked slightly frightened again, raising an eyebrow in a silent question.

“Could you please call me Harry? We’ll be stuck with each other for a few more weeks at least and...” Harry hesitated “it just seems silly to be close enough to come out to each other and still stick with last names. Plus the whole bed-issue…” He didn’t finish that thought, just gestured between the both of them.

“Well in that case _Harry_ , you may call me Draco.” Despite the nonchalance of Draco’s words, he looked nervous. Grey eyes flitted across the room and Harry could see the pale skin flush pink anew. Not knowing what to say or do, he stood awkwardly before turning with a mumbled, “uh.. yeah… I- I’ll see you later then… Draco,” and left.

Harry headed for the kitchen, hoping to be alone with his thoughts for a moment. After a moment, he took out some flour and yeast and started making bread; the kneading helping him find clarity in his mind. 

He cleaned the kitchen while he waited for the dough to rise but in the end he simply put a delayed stasis charm on the whole bowl and went back upstairs. While the kneading had indeed helped him clear his head, it had also left him covered with flour and he needed a shower before bed. 

When Harry slipped into bed that evening, Draco sent him a little smile before wordlessly dimming his Lumos. They bade each other good night and Harry slipped into a dream without much trouble.

\---

To his surprise Harry woke to his wand ringing on his side of the bed. Alone. Or well, as alone as one gets when sharing a bed with someone. At least they weren’t touching. So he got up, grabbed his clothes for the day and went into the bathroom.

When he emerged 5 minutes later Draco was awake too and he greeted him with a joyful “Good morning!”

Draco in return only huffed and shuffled into the bathroom, clearly not a morning person. Harry carefully categorized that info, although he didn’t know why he bothered. Harry left the room so his roommate could wake up properly, and went to put his prepared bread in the oven.

After breakfast had been cleared from the table, Harry gathered his coursework and started his essay on the use of sympathetic magic in defensive spellcasting. To his surprise Draco joined him shortly after. They sat in silence, working away on their respective essays. It had been awkward at first but over time they became more comfortable and Harry felt himself procrastinating the end of the essay in order to stay.

After he had been scribbling away on the same line for nearly 10 minutes he gave up. He could just as well start another essay, despite it being potions theory. So he finished his defense essay and belatedly realized that his potions book was still in his trunk. Well at least he could put on the kettle while getting the book. 

“Hey, you want a cuppa?” he offered and took the absent “huh? mmh” as an affirmation.

Harry returned with his potions book pressed between his elbow and ribs, carrying two mugs of steaming tea. When he placed one in front of Draco, the blond looked up, startled. Harry saw confusion hush over the face and offered the obvious explanation, “I made tea: no milk, one and a half sugars.”

Dracos eyebrows shot up and Harry realized that he knew the others tea preferences without asking. Feeling heat rise up in his cheeks, Harry quickly busied himself with getting settled into his work again, flashing Draco a quick smile when he was thanked for the tea.

An hour later Harry was stuck. He knew why he had avoided doing the potions work, who cared whether he chopped, ground or finely sliced the ingredients? In the end the stuff would be in small pieces and mixed into a bunch of other stuff. But apparently that was not how potions worked and now he had to explain exactly why that. Bloody fantastic.

“You’re smart, right?” he asked while nudging Draco with his elbow.

“Obviously,” drawled the other without looking up. 

“Smart enough to explain this to me?” Harry challenged and pointed to the text passage he was having problems with. A challenge proved to be the right approach as Draco looked up, squinting at Harry before skimming over the section.

“Oh that is actually easier than it reads. You see,” Draco began, sounding similar to Hermione. And as he explained, Harry finally understood how chopping may look the same as finely slicing it but the individual pieces were inconsistent in size, while slicing them made the pieces uniformly in size. Draco even explained when it was okay to chop and when uniformity really mattered. With each word Harry could understand how someone might find potions interesting after all.

\---

They continued studying like this for the next few days, mostly sitting in silence, only the scratching of quills on parchment filling the air. Every now and then they made tea and just talked. The first time they did that, it was still awkward but Harry pressed on. They ended up talking for an hour, tea and homework long forgotten. And though they had started on the topic of quidditch they somehow ended on a heated but friendly discussion about the benefits of wizarding vs muggle fashion. They only really stopped when they were interrupted by Neville asking them to clear the table for dinner.

And if Harry woke to warmth and strong arms wrapped unconsciously around him some mornings, who would have to know? 

At least that was what Harry told himself after waking to a sleeping Draco cuddling him for the third time in five days. A quick tempus told him that it was early enough to justify going back to sleep again, at least for a little bit. So instead of gently extracting himself from the arm placed around his middle, he stayed, snuggling back into the covers and fell back asleep.

In the morning he felt guilty. It was one thing to not tell Draco about him cuddling Harry while asleep, but to consciously enjoy it felt like using Draco. They still spent the day studying next to each other but Harry found that he couldn’t as freely join into the easy flow of conversation they had grown used to in the past week. If Draco noticed his odd behaviour he didn’t comment on it.

That night when Harry slipped into bed, he forced himself to not turn his back to Draco and instead faced the ceiling, hoping the change in position would stop the cuddling and his emotions.

\---

He should have known that it wouldn’t help, but he hadn’t expected to make it worse. Instead of waking to an arm around his waist and a Draco warming his back from a small distance, Harry woke on his back, arms wrapped around a sleeping Draco Malfoy, who lay half on top of Harry.

Harry’s heart began racing and he was very glad that the leg Draco had thrown over him lay across his thighs and not his hips. As gently as possible, he turned them both onto the side and carefully pulled his arm out from under Draco's head, praying to Merlin and Morgana that the blond was a heavy sleeper.

Finally free, Harry rushed into the bathroom to have an icy cold shower.

Slightly calmer, he exited the bathroom. Draco sat on the bed, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, “Morning Harry,” he yawned. Harry let out an awkward “Hi” and faced his trunk, putting his toiletries back.

“Hey, I heard Thomas and Longbottom talk about some market in town and I really wanna go.” Draco said, sounding slightly more awake.

“Then go?” Harry replied confused.

“It’s a muggle town Harry,” came a gentle reminder from the bed. After a long pause, during which Harry just continued staring at Draco in question, Draco added, “I’m pants with muggles. Would you come with me?”

“Uhm… sure?”

\---

They walked to the centre of town after breakfast, safely clad in layers of clothing. Their footsteps crunched in the snow and Draco chatted away about some news he had read in the Daily Prophet that day. Harry could only listen with half an ear, his thoughts kept drifting back to the morning and the feel of Draco in his arms. He itched to reach out and take the others hand.

It turned out that the market wasn’t a farmers market as they expected, but rather a Christmas market, which made Draco somehow even more excited. As if the mere existence of Christmas markets was wonderful and the fact that Draco could visit one was a miracle.

They passed stands full of sweets, mulled wine, hot mead and stands selling handcrafted items; pottery, candles, woodwork, lanterns… everything obviously made with love. Each stand Draco stood and admired the artworks, occasionally involving Harry to help him with the muggle money when he bought something.

They had seen maybe half of the stands when Draco turned to Harry, “Thank you for coming with me. This is wonderful.” He said, smiling so warmly at Harry that the dark haired man felt his heart clench.

And as Draco looked at Harry with a sparkle in his eyes and excitement spraying from every fibre of his being, Harry blurted out, “Merlin I wanna kiss you.” 

Immediately he felt his cheeks heat against the cold winter air and he looked at his feet. His mind raced to find a way to take it back, find something to say to make it seem like he was joking, but before he could think of anything useful it got interrupted by a slightly shaky, “Then do it.”

Harry’s head snapped up fast enough that he nearly lost his hat. Draco had blushed too, his hands shoved into his coat pockets, but his face showed a clear invitation. Almost shyly did Harry step forward, a gloved hand reached up to cup the porcelain face, his body leaned forward a bit.

When their lips met, Harry felt his brain short-circuit. Cold lips warmed within seconds, melting into each other. At some point Draco had pulled his hands out of his pockets, embracing Harry gently, while Harry’s own hand had wandered from cupping his cheek to resting on Draco’s chest. The kiss was sweet, sensual and absolutely breathtaking. Draco and Harry were both panting slightly once they pulled apart. 

They stood in the middle of the market for a few more seconds, faces alight with giddy smiles, arms still around each other, before Harry gently pulled from the embrace. He caught Draco’s hand in his and together they continued browsing the market, sneaking glances at each other every now and then.

Two hours later they had reached the end of the market and were positively frozen despite holding hands. Neither spoke of the kiss as they started on the way back to the cottage. But after a few metres away from the distractions of the market, Harry’s brain kept thinking back to it and to waking up in each others arms. He figured he should open up about it and cleared his throat.

“Draco? Can we talk?” 

“I don’t regret it Harry. If I didn’t want it I would have pushed you away.” Draco laughed.

“That's not what I meant but nice to know anyhow. I meant our sleeping situation.” Merlin that sounded weird.

“Want to take me to bed already? Isn’t that moving a bit fast?” teased the blond. Harry snorted and decided to rip it off like a band-aid. 

“Good one. But I was talking about how we’ve been cuddling at night for the past weeks. Or well you hugging me in your sleep mostly.”

Draco stopped walking, “What?”

Harry rushed to explain, that neither of them had done it consciously and that he hadn’t said anything because he never knew how to broach the subject. “I mean it’s not that bad anyway, I… kinda like it,” he admitted and thinking back to the day before added, “Which is why I was so quiet yesterday. I … kind of woke up to it and just decided to continue sleeping because it felt… well nice. I’m super sorry about that by the way.”

Draco was silent for a moment but eventually said, “It’s okay. I would have… liked you to like it if I had been awake.” They smiled coyly at each other.

After a moment Draco’s eyes went wide. “I said your name, didn’t I?” he asked, blushing again and it was Harry's turn to be confused by the question. Draco squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, steeling himself for what he would say next. 

“The sex dream you heard. I said your name, didn’t I?”

Harry felt himself blush too. “Uhm… yeah.” he admitted hesitantly. To his surprise Draco started laughing.

“No wonder you were so spooked!” Another laugh. “Well, surprise, I think you're fit.” Draco admitted, offering his hand to Harry, who took it. Instead of continuing their way back though, he pulled Draco closer. 

“You’re beautiful,” he murmured before kissing him again.

Their second kiss was almost better than the first one; less sweet and more open. Harry could see himself getting addicted to kissing Draco, it felt heavenly. 

They kissed for what felt like forever before they felt frozen to the bone. Hand in hand they walked the remaining way to the cottage, past snow-covered trees and candle lit windows.

That night when Harry slipped into bed, he felt Draco cuddling into his side almost immediately, and he in turn wrapped his arms around him. Harry looked forward to waking in his arms time and time again.

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos and comments are always appreciated :)


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